Elizabethan Homebrewing

Tofi Kerthjalfadsson

Pennsic XXV

Introduction

Beer was a staple of the northern European diet during the medieval
and renaissance periods. Although much beer was made by monks and by
guilds in the cities, in England through the end of our period, most
beer was brewed at the manor house by its residents. As one of many
staple food stuffs, beer and its making were generally the domain of
the Lady of the manor and her cooking staff. Most of the references
we have for brewing are from cook books, often close to and associated
with the sections on baking.

In saying "Beer is period." one must be careful. American Light Lager
is most certainly not period, even for the city of Pilz in what is now
the Czech Republic [Jackson, pp. 31]. But neither is Irish Stout, for
many of the same reasons. So what kind of beer is `period?'
Fortunately for Elizabethan England, we have some primary sources and
some good secondary ones, so we can make it to find out.

In general, beers from Elizabethan England would be somewhat heavier
(with wide variation), somewhat sweeter, and less bitter than what is
available in England today. They would range in color from light to
dark brown, due to the malts used. They would have considerably less
carbonation than today. And they would be pretty fresh, possibly even
`green' by today's standards.

Materials

The materials we use will effect the resulting beer almost as much as
the techniques, so we have to be fairly careful about what we use and
why. In general, beer is made from grains, spices, water, and yeast.

Grains

The most common grain in beer is malted barley. Wheat is also fairly
common, often in smaller quantities, as are oats. Malting is a
process which both preserves a grain for longer-term storage than is
possible in the raw form, and activates enzymes in the grain that help
turn starches into sugars. After the grain is harvested, it is
moistened and allowed to sprout and grow for a few days, then dried in
an oven at low to moderate temperatures, and finally threshed and
stored.

Traditionally the sprouting would be carried out on a large floor
[Markham, pp. 182-185], often in the attic of the malt house. As
the grain sprouts, it generates heat. This must be allowed to escape
so that the malting grain does not cook itself. The young plants also
require carbon dioxide to continue growing. To facilitate this, the
malt is turned (scoop it up, flip it over) at regular intervals. A
few British maltsters are still producing floor-malt today, though it
is rare and expensive.

Historically, kilning was often carried out in what is essentially a
large wood oven or smoker. The malt would be spread out on a
false-floor made of hair-cloth, straw mat, or other suitable material,
on top of some time of loose material, so to allow the hot exhaust
from the kiln's oven to evenly penetrate the grain. Then a wood fire
would be built in the oven, and the malt baked for several hours, and
occasionally turned to prevent burning [Markham, pp. 186-190].

Modern kilning is quite different. Today the malt is roasted in a
drum with a water spray to control temperature, patented by D. Wheeler
in 1817 [Harrison]. The drum roaster can produce malt that is paler
than possible using the traditional kiln, leading to the light-amber
color of modern beers such as Bud or Bass. It also can roast malt and
unmalted grain far darker than possible. Since the deeply roasted
taste and very dark color from these are an integral part of the
modern porter and stout, Guinness isn't much closer to the mark.

We can make a decent approximation to the amber and brown malts at
home by roasting Pale malt in an oven. I have successfully used the
technique described by Robert Grossman [Zymurgy special 95]. Briefly,
one spreads out one or two pounds of malt in a cookie sheet or two,
put them in a pre-heated oven, and bake for a while. 10 minutes at
300 F gives a nice slightly roasted character to Pale malt without
deactivating the enzymes. 20 mins. at 350 F produces an amber
malt, but deactivates the enzymes. Doing this to 10-- 20% of the malt
adds a nice character to an ale. 50 mins. at 350 will produce a nice
brown malt, useful in making historic dark ales and porters. For
Elizabethan ales, I prefer roasting about half my malt for 10 mins.,
and another pound or two for 20, in order to simulate the vagaries of
traditional kilning.

British, Belgian, German, and American malts are all somewhat
different. British Pale malt comes from a 2-row variety of barley, is
allowed to sprout for a somewhat longer period of time, thus more of
the very long starches are modified [Lager, pp. 87], and is kilned at
a reasonably low temperature. The Belgian and German malts are often
less modified, and kilned differently. The American malts are most
often 6-row barley, which is a different, modern strain of barley.
Most homebrewing stores either carry British Pale malt, or can get it.

Plain wheat and oats are easy to find. If your homebrewing supplies
store doesn't carry these, check in health-food stores, or even normal
grocery stores. Malted wheat can be found in brewing supply stores.
I have not yet found a source of malted oats. This is unfortunate, as
several medieval recipes use them.

Hops

Hops may have been first introduced into the British Isles in the
early medieval period, but they were not commonly found in beer until
the Reformation. Even through the 17th century, unhopped ales could
be found. Hops were fairly expensive, and so were used in much
smaller quantities than we would find in a modern India Pale Ale such
as Bass.

There are many varieties of hops, but most of them are too recent.
Using one of the Noble varieties of hops, such as European Hallertau
or Kent Goldings is about the best we are going to manage.

Spices

I've seen all sorts of things used for a Gruit, or spice mixture, in
medieval ales, and even more things claimed. For instance, in one ca
1300 recipe, about 6 grams each of Sweet Gale, Marsh Rosemary, and
Yarrow are called for (for a 5 US gallon batch). In ca. 1400 recipe,
Cinnamon, Ginger, Cloves, and White Pepper are called for [Harrison,
pp. 21-23]. At this point I suspect that just about anything would be
fair game, so long as it was available (and not too expensive).
Consult a good herbalist.

Water

Water characteristics vary quite a bit in Britain. In
Burton-on-Trent, the water is very hard, well matching darker,
heavier-bodied beers. In Scotland, the water is often fairly soft. I
don't stress too much about my water hardness, though I tend to use
harder water for English beers than for Welsh or Scottish ones. If
you are really interested, consult Noonan [Lager].

Yeast

Unfortunately, we have really very little idea what kind of yeast was
used. The idea that yeast is a microorganism that can be cultured and
bred is, of course, entirely modern, thanks to the efforts of Pasteur.
Many of the desirable traits are naturally selected for by reusing the
yeast of one batch in another, over and over. And brewers would
generally trade yeasts, so particularly good yeast strains would be
propagated pretty quickly within a region.

I personally like to use English or Scottish ale yeasts for British
ales. Though modern English Ale yeast may be different than the
strains used 400 years ago, modern Belgian or German (Alt) yeast is
likely even more different. I prefer liquid yeasts to dry ones. They
are somewhat more expensive (at $5 a pouch vs. $0.75 a packet), but
well cared for, a good strain can last through many batches.

Techniques

Mashing is the process of converting the starches in the grains into
fermentable sugars, using the enzymes in the grain. This is done by
holding a mixture of grains and water at a relatively high temperature
for a period of time (e.g. 150 F for an hour). Modern brewers know
quite a bit about what the various enzymes do, and at which levels of
acidity and temperature each enzyme works best.

The medieval brewer was of course unaware of the enzymes found in the
malt. That is not to say that the he or she was ignorant of the need
to maintain the proper temperature; this behavior would be found by
trial and error. In recreating pre-scientific brewing, we are
attempting to rediscover rules-of-thumb that will give us
approximately the right results.

Infusion mashing

Barley, wheat, oats, and other grains, peas [Markham, pp. 207], and
dried beans [Harrison, pp. 24] have all been used to make beer. These
have few simple sugars, but an abundance of long starches, tightly
packed together. Unfortunately, yeast can't digest starches, so we
need some way of turning these starches into sugars. Fortunately
barley and wheat (and to a lesser extent oats) also come with a way to
perform such a stunt. If the grain is allowed to sprout in some
water, and allowed to grow just a bit, the young plant will produce
enzymes that break down the starches and turn them into sugars.
Normally, these enzymes act very slowly, but they will work much
faster if exposed to more heat and water than usual.

So the grain is allowed to sprout and grow just a bit, and then dried
out in an oven, a process known as malting. An extra benefit is that
malted grain will store much longer than normal grain will. So it is
safe to harvest and malt large quantities of grain, brew with some,
and store the rest for winter and spring brewing.

After the grain has been malted, it can be mashed. In this process,
the remaining starches are converted to simple sugars by mixing the
grain, after being crushed (lightly ground) with hot water (usually
145-158 F), and held in this temperature range for an hour or three.
During this time, the enzymes will convert almost all of the starches
into simple sugars that the yeast can digest.

A starch molecule is made of a long chain of simple sugars all linked
together. There are two enzymes that work together to break this long
chain down into small pieces. Alpha- amylase cuts long starch chains
into smaller pieces, still too large to be digestible to yeast.
Beta-amylase cuts very small pieces, simple sugars suitable to yeast,
off the ends of the starch chains. So the two working together do a
very good job of breaking down the long starches into sugars.
Beta-amylase is most active at somewhat higher temperatures than
Alpha, but there is a fair overlap in their useful temperature ranges
[Lager, pp. 88-89]. The most important thing about all this to the
brewer is that the higher the temperature mash, the sweeter the
resulting beer will be.

Double and triple mashing

The general mashing technique used by brewers in the British Isles in
the Elizabethan period was double (or triple)
infusion mashing. In
this, the grains are mixed with hot water, allowed to sit a while, and
then the liquor is drained off into the boiling vessel. Then a second
batch of hot water is added to the grains, which are again allowed to
steep as the first wort is boiled. After the first wort is poured off
to cool, the second batch of liquor is drained off and boiled. For
very potent beers, a third running would be performed in the same way.

These second and third mashings are mostly useless for enzyme activity
- the enzymes have mostly quit by the time the first mashing is
over. But not all of the sugars will be collected in the first
running. These second mashings serve to rinse more sugar out of the
grain, giving weaker beers for the effort.

In modern brewing, we use a technique called sparging to run off the
first running and rinse sugars out of the grains. This is essentially
equivalent to doing the above procedure into the same vessel. In
fact, [Belgian Ale, pp. 84] describes just such a technique, where the
liquor is run completely off before the sparge water is added.
Sparging is good for increasing the conversion efficiency of the
runnings, but does not seem to have been adopted by English brewers
until the mid-19th century. In [Scotch Ale, pp. 90], Noonan quotes
W. H. Roberts, a Scottish brewer, writing in 1847:

The process of sparging is, in my opinion, decidedly preferable to a
second mash for ale worts, and has ever been considered in this light
by the whole of Scottish brewers.

German brewers today sometimes use a method known as decoction. I
won't be talking about it because (to the best of my knowledge)
English brewers have not ever used this technique.

Equipment

I use a 10-gallon Rubbermaid-brand water cooler, with an
Easymasher(tm) screen-manifold (a 6-inch tube of stainless-steel
screen, closed on one end and attached to a tube on the other)
installed inside. This may seem like awfully modern equipment, but it
is surprisingly well motivated. In "Scotch Ale from my Lady Holmbey",
Digbie writes:

Heat Spring-water; it must not boil, but be ready to boil, which you
will know by leaping up in bubbles. Then pour it to the Malt; but by
little and little, stirring them strongly together all the while they
are mingling. When all the water is in, it must be so proportioned
that it be very thick. Then cover the vessel well with a thick Mat
made on purpose with a hole for the stick, and that with Coverlets and
Blankets to keep in all the heat. After three or four hours, let it
run out by the stick (putting new heated water upon the Malt, if you
please, for small Ale or Beer) into a Hogshead with the head out. ...

Here, Digbie has told us to make a thick, hot, mash, in an insulated
vessel. Further, he describes how the liquor is emptied from it. In
emptying, a small amount of scrunge will come out through the hole.
But fairly quickly, the husks of the grain will get in the way and act
as a filter to keep the smaller particles out of the liquor, which
will run down the sides of the stick and out the hole. In much the
same way, the screen, manifold, or false- bottom in the cooler will
allow the grain to filter the runnings.

When converting a recipe from original units down to a 5-gallon batch,
a modern brewer may be quite surprised at the quantities of grain
involved. When I first figured out Harrison's recipe [Misc-4], I came
up with 4.75 lbs. of grain per gallon of wort. I was used to getting
an extraction rate of 0.027 or more per gallon, and was taken aback by
the prospect of a starting gravity of 1.128. But that extraction rate
only applied to modern sparging; for the first runnings of the recipe,
my first runnings were 1.071, or 0.015 per gallon, and for all three
runnings my extraction was only 0.025. Clearly one reason those 19th
C. Scotts preferred sparging was frugality.

Getting the right temperature without a thermometer

The thermometer is a modern device. This is most unfortunate, since
control over temperature is vital to successful all-grain brewing.
Fortunately, we can still get pretty good temperature control by
mixing lots of boiling water with some cold water and the cold grain
to achieve a good mash temperature. A good first guess is to
calculate the weight- averaged temperature of the combination. So for
instance, 20 pints of boiling water (212 F), 3 pint of cold water (45
F), and 10 lbs. of malted barley at room temperature (70 F) should
average out to 153.8 F. This is almost right, but not quite for three
reasons. First off, the inside of the mash tun will also need to be
heated up, contributing a bit more cool weight. Second, pouring the
boiling water through the air will cool it down a bit, as vapor
escapes into the air. Finally, the malt will use up some of the heat
energy in the chemical processes of mashing, especially at first, so
the water will need to be a little extra hot before the grain is
added. As a rough rule of thumb, I've found that for a rate of 1 US
quart of water per pound of grain, 170 F is a good water temperature
to end up with a mash around 150-153 F. To get this method right for
your equipment, you'll have to try it and find out. Start by mixing
up the hot and cold water in your lauter tun, and measure the
temperature. If it is around 170-174, add the grain, stir it all up
and measure again. If it is a bit cold, add some more boiling water;
if it is a bit hot, add a small amount of cold water. (It takes
almost twice as much boiling water to go up 5 degrees as it takes cold
water to go down 5 degrees at normal mash temperatures.)

Boiling

Boiling is pretty much the same today as it was back then. We've
collected a bunch of mash liquor in a large pot, which we put over a
fire and boil for about an hour. The pots are somewhat different
today - a fortunate brewer would have a large copper pot, but a less
fortunate brewer might have one made of lead. Important: don't use a
lead vessel, it is poisonous, as is anything made in it. Today the
most common pots for homebrewers are made of stainless steel or
enameled steel. Either is fine (though a good commercial stainless
steel pot is both nicer to use and more expensive). I'm not so sure
about aluminum. Some folks say it is fine, others say using an
aluminum pot will give a nasty metallic taste to the beer.

Cooling

Cooling seems to have been done by one of two techniques. The wort
could have been transferred into a barrel, and allowed to sit and cool
over a day or so. This technique is used in Digbie, in "Scotch Ale
from my Lady Holmbey" [Digbie, pp. 99]:

... Then put it again into the Caldron, and boil it an hour or an hour
and a half. Then put it into a Woodden-vessel to cool, which will
require near forty hours for a hogshead. Then pour it gently from the
settling. ...

Evaporation is a quicker way to cool the hot wort. In Markham, "of
brewing ordinary beer", the author says "...this done, put the wort
through a straight sieve, which may drain the hops from it, into your
cooler,..." with the footnote:

"When the hops and liquor shall have thus boiled twelve hours, they
empty the copper again, and put the wort to cool at leisure into other
vessels called floats or coolers, and they be broad like unto the
vats, but only one foot deep." (Surflet, ed. Markham, p 587)

The practice of using large shallow open vats to cool the wort is
still practiced today in Belgium [Belgian Ale, pp. 38; De
Keersmaecker, pp. 78]. This has the side-effect of inoculating the
wort with wild yeasts, along with an astonishing number of other
microbes [De Keersmaecker]

Fermenting

Both Digbie and Markham recommend making a yeast starter in order to
have a sufficient quantity of yeast to attack the large size batches
they are making. Digbie advises [Digbie, pp. 99]:

... This quantity (of a hogshead) will require better then a quart of
the best Ale- barm, which you must put to it thus. Put it to about
three quarts of wort, and stir it, to make it work well. When the
barm has risen quick scum it off and put to the rest of the wort by
degrees. The remaining Liquor (that is the three quarts) will have
drawn into it all the heavy dregs of the barm, and you may put it to
the Ale of the second running, but not to this. Put the barm you have
scummed off (which will be at least a quart) to about two gallons of
the wort, and stir it to make that rise and work. Then put two
Gallons more to it. Doing thus several times, till all be mingled,
which will require a whole day to do. Cover it close, and let it
work, till it be at it's height, and begin to fall, which may require
ten or twelve hours, or more. Watch this well, least it sink too
much, for then it will be dead. Then scum off the thickest part of
the barm, and run your Ale into the hogshead, ...

Markham recommends something similar, though not as complex a
technique. He says to combine some of your wort (presumably cool
enough) with some barm (yeast), and let these work while the main
batch is cooling. Then when the main batch is cool, stir up this
starter well and mix it in.

Using a starter is good practice in modern, as well as medieval
brewing. Starting with a large quantity of yeast will reduce the
effects of wild yeasts and other microorganisms by overwhelming them
by sheer number, and eating up all the available sugar.

At this point, a modern brewer would pitch in the yeast, make sure the
wort is well aerated, and put on a blow-off tube or fermentation lock.
Digbie recommends the former [Digbie, pp. 99]:

... and run your Ale into the hogshead; leaving all the bung open a
day or two. Then lay a strong Paper upon it, to keep the clay from
falling in, that you must then lay upon it, in which you must make a
little hole to let it work out. You must have some of the same Liquor
to fill it up, as it works over.

Here Digbie essentially describes a blow-off vessel. The bung is left
open so the active fermentation can foam over and blow any crud that
may be on the surface of the liquor out of the barrel. Markham
advises much the same [Markham, pp. 206]:

... and then, beating it and the barm exceeding well together, tun it
up into the hogsheads being clean washed and scalded, and so let it
purge: and herein you shall observe not to tun your vessels too full,
for fear thereby it purge too much of the barm away: when it hath
purged a day and a night, you shall close up the bung holes with clay,
and only for a day or two after keep a vent-hole in it, and after
close it up as close as may be.

This is still done in parts of Belgium, especially in making Lambic
[De Keersmaecker, pp. 79]. I usually use either a large tub
fermenter (which avoids the blow-off tube hassle, but requires
skimming at least once), or a glass fermenter with a large diameter (1
inch I.D.) blow-off tube.

Storage

For the final part of the Scotch Ale recipe, Digbie says [Digbie,
pp. 99]:

When it hath done working, stop it up very close, and keep it in a
very cold Cellar. It will be fit to broach after a year; and be very
clear and sweet and pleasant, and will continue a year longer drawing;
and the last glass full be as pure and quick as the first. You begin
to broach it high. Let your Cask have served for Sweet-wine.

Kegging the beer would be the most appropriate way to store and serve
it, and also the least amount of work. I often bottle mine, even
though the technique of cork bottling was at very best `late period.'
For this, I recommend whatever you are most comfortable with. Storing
the bottles or kegs in a suitably cool cellar is always good practice.
The beer takes a bit longer to mature, but has a much smoother and
better taste.

Conclusion

Elizabethan beers can be recreated with relative ease by the modern
medievalist. They are fairly easy to make and well worth the effort.
And they do not require any extraordinary equipment; only an attention
to the details of the materials and processes.